


Winter

by Hope



Category: Lord of the Rings - Fandom
Genre: Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2002-05-24
Updated: 2002-05-24
Packaged: 2017-10-02 13:36:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,256
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6944
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hope/pseuds/Hope
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Frodo falls ill again.  (set in the Shire during RotK) angst.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Winter

Several things alerted Sam to the fact that something was wrong when he entered Bag End. The smial was cold, and the absence of the smell of a meal cooking almost as obvious as the complete lack of light in the hall - and the bulbous glass of the lanterns were cool to the touch as he fumbled along it, making his way to the kitchen. Because that was another thing. The sound of Rosie sobbing softly echoed ethereally along the round hallways and empty rooms of the smial, and Sam's heart caught and almost broke when he heard it.

"Rosie?" he called, voice betraying his sudden anxiety. "Rose!"

He stubbed his toes over something overturned as he finally stumbled into the kitchen, but any pain he might have suffered over it went unnoticed as he caught sight of his wife. Uncoiled from its usual bun, her hair fell down her back in a thick plait, wisps of curls escaping and quivering slightly as her body shifted with her sobs. Her belly was too huge for her to possibly rest elbows on her knees and bow her face into her hands, but she sat as if she had fallen on a low stool, face hidden in the crook of her elbow, forearm resting along the edge of the unnaturally cold stove.

"Rosie!" Sam's low cry was one of pain, and he dropped to his knees before her as she lifted her face with an expression of almost surprise. Her eyes and nose were red, her cheeks stained with tears. Sam took her face in his hands and pulled her as close as he could, arms reaching out over her swollen belly and wrapping around her shoulders.

"Oh Sam," she sighed, her voice hitching. She grasped his shoulders tightly, hiccuping slightly as her sobs gradually ceased. "I-I didn't know what to do. You weren't here and I . . . didn't know what to do . . ." She trailed off into another sigh.

"Hush, now," Sam murmured, softly stroking her hair. "What happened?"

"I . . . It's Mr. Frodo."

Suddenly the world lurched, and it felt as if Rosie were miles away, as if he himself were miles away and he couldn't even feel the sensation of his arms, curled around her shoulders, or his knees, creaking in protest on the cold stone floor. Bag End's halls and rooms suddenly seemed *too* silent.

"He . . . He's had another turn." Even her voice seemed far away.

The moon rose enough send a thick square of light through the kitchen window, reflected and brightened by the thick covering of snow that stained the outside world. Sam could see in the cold light flooding the room what he had stubbed his toes on as he had come into the kitchen. The small but sturdy table was too decorative for a kitchen, Rosie always said, but Sam came in every morning and placed a vase of fresh flowers on it and she never removed it. The vase was shattered now, the water pooling blackly on the stone floor, and the table lay not far from its usual position by the doorway, upturned.

"Where is he?" Sam whispered, his heart pounding.

"I . . . He left," Rosie started sobbing afresh at the tone of Sam's voice.

"Left?" Sam cried in dismay, leaping to his feet. "Where? Where did he go?"

"I don't know!" Rosie cried. "He just . . . he kept on saying he 'had to get out, he had to get out'. He ran away!"

Sam barely heard her last words as he leaped over the fallen table and back down the main hallway of Bag End, wrenching open the wide green door and throwing himself out into the night.

"Frodo!" he called desperately, slogging through the snow down the garden path. "Mr Frodo!"

He halted suddenly with his hand upon the gate, forcing himself to calm. *Don't be a fool, Sam Gamgee* he commanded himself silently. *Or it'll be the ruin of us all. Now, you didn't see no footprints when you came home not ten minutes ago, and Rosie would have lit the fires as soon as it was dark, if this hadn't happened. And we haven't had a fall of snow since near lunchtime.*

Turning back from the gate towards the door of Bag End - wreathed darkly with ivy vines - he saw what he was looking for: a set of dragging footsteps, dark in the brilliant white of the snow (the contrast sharper with the night), turning off sharply from the path and disappearing around the corner, leading to the back gardens of the smial.

"Coming, Mr Frodo!" Sam cried, following the trail Frodo had left at a run. Every stumble, revealed through an extended gouge in the snow, making him feel as if his heart would beat right out of his chest.

* * *

He saw him, at last, a smudge of darkness pressed against the steep bank at the back of Bag End; and Sam ran towards him with a cry - half of joy, half-fear when he saw the figure wasn't moving.

"Frodo, Frodo!" he called, falling too his knees even as he skid to a halt, gathering Frodo up in his arms. Frodo was cold, but alive; even as Sam held and rocked him, his eyes fluttered open and his breath came in small puffs of steam, far apart.

"Sam," he murmured hoarsely, his eyes appearing not to see Sam's face but to stare rather beyond it. "We have to keep going, Sam." His eyes slid closed and he suddenly struggled upwards, trying to rise to his feet. Sam drew back slightly in surprise and Frodo half-stood before dropping down to the snow again. "We have to keep going. We can't stop now. We're so close." He leaned forward in the snow, raising himself on shaking arms and beginning to inch forward on hands and knees. He trembled. "It's so heavy, Sam," he whispered. "It's so heavy . . ."

Sam was sure his heart would crack and break in two, the fingers of ice clinging to every twig of every tree around them mocking the tears that stung his eyes yet refused to fall. "Come on, now," he murmured, drawing Frodo to him once more and gathering the slight body closer in his arms before rising too his feet. "Time to get you home."

Frodo offered no resistance. "We have to keep going," he whispered. There was blood under Frodo's fingernails, Sam noticed now - his heart clenching unbearably - and a stain of crimson at the neck of his shirt. The milky scar on the flesh it covered was as familiar to Sam as the absence of a finger on Frodo's right hand. There would, perhaps, be other scars to add to it now - the scrape of Frodo's fingernails as he scrabbled desperately for something which no longer existed, scratching into the cloudy scar that spoke of months of friction and pain as It rubbed against his skin and grew heavier, heavier.

* * *

Rosie had lit the fire by the time they returned to Bag End - this had happened before, and although the shock of it always caught her off guard, she knew Frodo would be needing warmth and her husband's comfort. And if that was what he needed, she would allow him that, give it to him as much as she was able. She left the lanterns in the hall unlit, though; she knew how Frodo couldn't bear the light when he had his turns, and Sam could find his way easily enough with the orange glow of the fire from the kitchen.

**Author's Note:**

> http://hopeful-fiction.livejournal.com/2195.html


End file.
